TUC general secretary Brendan Barber once claimed that Ernset Bevin was his hero and inspiration. Appropriate then that Bevin’s ambiguous legacy is evident in the TUC’s recent decision to boycott Israel, a move that represents a capitulation to the far left that Bevin fought so vigorously, while also recalling his anti-Semitism and hostility to the Jewish state.
The international labor movement recently held a global day of solidarity with Iranian workers. All the more perverse then, write Benny Weinthal and Eric Lee, that while most unions are excited by the prospects for an Iranian version of “Solidarnosc“, the British Trades Union Congress is focused on boycotting Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East and home of the region’s only independent labor movement.
“Iranian workers would give anything to have the political freedoms, including the right to strike, that Israelis – including Israeli Arabs – have had for decades,” they note. Other labor activists have condemned the TUC’s move for seeking “to impose military and economic sanctions against only one party to the conflict – the state of Israel and its democratic trade union center, the Histadrut.”
